B'Elanna's Choice
by DianeB
Summary: After "Scientific Method," B'Elanna has a choice to make, and it's not one she makes lightly. People, this is FANFIC, not a lesson in morality. If you don't care for the subject matter (that is, what to do about a surprise pregnancy), do not read it! How much clearer could that be? The sequel, formerly its own story, is now Chapter 2.
1. B'Elanna's Choice

Author's Note: (11/00) This story begins three weeks after the events of "Scientific Method," thus well before _Voyager_'s run-in with the Hirogen, outlining a _possible_ Paris/Torres scenario. Written in June, 1999. Rated R for some strong language and mildly-descriptive sex.

Big thanks to J.A. Toner and YCD for their invaluable help.

Disclaimer: Paramount, er, CBS owns it all. Probably always will. I accept this.

B'Elanna's Choice 1:  
B'Elanna's Choice  
by DianeB

"God fucking damn!" B'Elanna spat in Spanish – about the only words she could remember from her long gone father – along with the contents of her stomach into the toilet over which she was draped.

This could not be. This could _not_ be.

Hanging there, puking for the _second_ time that morning, she recalled vividly the moment when this very well _could_ have been.

**oOo oOo oOo**

_She heard the sound of the transporter and looked up to see an arm materialize in the hatchway above her, clutching a big bunch of flowers. The flowers were new, the arm was not._

"_Are those supposed to make up for canceling on me last night?"_

_He clamored down the access ladder to where she was. "I got stuck with an extra shift on the Bridge. What could I say? 'Sorry, Captain, I've got a date with B'Elanna?'"_

_Sometime after that, Tom kissed her, but she broke it off, thinking she had heard something._

"_I must be completely paranoid about getting caught in a compromising position."_

"_Kind of exciting, isn't it?" Tom teased, moving in to kiss her again._

_And then, despite her feeling that someone was watching them, she suddenly couldn't resist him, couldn't stop him, and didn't want to. The urge for sex was so consuming, so fevered, she had no thought to anything but getting him inside her. The feeling was an order of magnitude stronger than anything she had felt during her bout with the blood fever._

_She yanked viciously at his uniform, desperate to consummate this overpowering need._

_Tom seemed to be at the same urgent moment as she, for he had her pinned against the wall, delivering bruising kisses, the swell of his groin pressing into her belly. His hands struggled to remove her uniform just as frantically as she was struggling to remove his._

_By the time they were sufficiently naked to do the deed, B'Elanna's blood was boiling and a red haze of lust blinded her. Uttering a deep-throated moan, she crushed herself to him._

_She snarled without preamble, "Fuck me now, Tom!"_

_He lifted her roughly and impaled her, shoving her against the wall again. There was no question that this was, indeed, _fucking_. No stretch of the imagination could include any sense of love to the act at all._

_But there was a sense of consent from the couple involved, and the stroking, thrusting motions quickly accelerated to release._

_Tom stiffened and came first, with B'Elanna not far behind._

_The whole thing had lasted less than five minutes and no words had been exchanged._

_Sweating, satiated, and aware of her surroundings once again, B'Elanna slid off Tom and continued sliding down against the wall until her damp bare ass hit the floor. She wiped at her bruised lips, covered her eyes with her hand._

_Sometime during their frenzied activity, the bouquet had been destroyed. Pieces of flowers were scattered everywhere._

"_My god, Tom, what was _that?_"_

_Still standing, Tom had leaned over and put his hands on his thighs, trying to catch his breath. The smell of sex filled the tiny space, and it was clear he had no more an idea of what _that_ was than she had._

**oOo oOo oOo**

Heaving herself up from her kneeling position, she threw off her nightshirt and stepped into the shower, turning it on full force and letting the hot water pummel her, wishing she could just dissolve down the drain. Instead, she finished her shower, dressed, and did something she knew would start the rumor mill grinding and probably give Tom a heart attack. But it could not be avoided or delayed.

She called Engineering and told Joe Carey she would be late. Then she went to Sickbay.

**oOo oOo oOo**

"Congratulations, Lieutenant Torres, you are pregnant. Exactly three weeks." The Doctor stopped waving his tricorder wand over her, clicked the instrument shut, and looked at her, eyebrow arched in question. "Why do I feel as though _congratulations_ was too hasty a sentiment?"

She sat up on the bed and sighed, not at all surprised by his news.

"Because, Doc, you're not thinking. You tell me I'm three weeks' pregnant. Three weeks ago, if you recall, the _Srivani_* were conducting their so-called scientific experiments on us. Tom and I talked later about whether or not they had been messing around with our hormones as part of their experiments, but we never gave one thought to whether or not they were also messing with our birth control." She leveled a dark Klingon glare at the Doctor. "I don't want this child."

In perfect hologram control, the Doctor never flinched. "Well, I appreciate your honesty, Lieutenant, but tell me, have you considered speaking with Lieutenant Paris? I should think he might be able to help you with any decision you make."

She sighed again. "Yes, I suppose you're right."

She slid off the biobed, but the movement was more than at least one of her stomachs wanted to handle. She gagged and slapped her hand to her mouth.

The Doctor, never missing a beat, smoothly swung around, grabbed a small stainless steel container from a nearby shelf, and handed it to her. "Perhaps you might like to see if Neelix has some plain crackers on hand. That's really the best thing I could prescribe for your nausea, although some women experience nausea throughout their entire pregnancy, no matter what they do."

Unfortunately – or fortunately, as the case may be – Tom Paris chose just this moment to come flying into Sickbay.

"B'Elanna! Oh my god, B'Elanna! What's wrong?" He braked just outside her personal space and stood there, bouncing on his toes, clearly wanting to comfort her but wary about getting any closer while she was engaged in such a distasteful activity.

She stretched one arm out towards him, palm facing out, and turned the rest of her body from him, clutching the silver container and continuing to retch.

Tom turned a puzzled look to the Doctor. "Lieutenant Paris, Lieutenant Torres should be through in another moment or two, as I doubt there could be much left in _either_ of her stomachs. Then, I believe, she has something to share with you."

**oOo oOo oOo**

B'Elanna never did figure out how they had gotten back to her quarters without telling Tom what was wrong. But they had arrived and she knew she could not keep this from him.

Not that she _wanted_ to keep it from him. Or anything like that. But still she did not speak.

While on their walk back to her quarters, B'Elanna considered her options. At this point she really only saw one, even though she knew in all honesty there were at least _two_ available to her. If she were in the Alpha Quadrant, (although, she reflected, if she were in the Alpha Quadrant, she was quite sure she wouldn't _be_ in this condition) she would have a few other options to choose from. An artificial womb, perhaps, or stasis for the fetus until she could be sure of what she wanted to do – possibly a surrogate, or even putting the baby up for adoption. But out here in the middle of nowhere, on a relatively small ship that was never meant to _be_ out in the middle of nowhere, these options were not available and a couple were just plain laughable.

Sitting on the couch beside Tom, she released a low sound of Klingon frustration, in part to gain some relief from the headache that was building behind her eyes, but also to cover deeper feelings she could not quite identify.

"Bella, angel, please."

The pleading endearments grated her, but she knew he had resorted to begging only because she hadn't said a word to him yet. The only words to say were the words she had to say, and she finally mustered the courage to do so.

"I'm pregnant."

She saw Tom freeze. She couldn't imagine what he might have been thinking about what could have caused her ailment, but it was clear in his rounded blue eyes that this was _not_ on his list.

"Say something." God, _déjà vu_. If he said 'You picked a great time to tell me,' she would kill him.

He rolled his shoulders and scooted closer to her on the couch. He already had her hand, so he squeezed it gently, caressing the back of it with his thumb.

"Well, uh, that's great…great news. Uh, isn't it?"

She felt anger rise in her throat and mix itself with the confusion already there. Determined not to display any sort of emotional weakness, she allowed the anger to consume the confusion and turned on Tom, fire in her eyes.

At her look, he threw her hand down and reared back, unsure of what he had done wrong.

"No, Tom, it's _not_ 'great news!' I'm exactly three weeks' pregnant, Tom, three weeks. Do you remember what we did three weeks ago, in junction 47, in front of God and everybody, without a thought whatsoever to anything but screwing our brains out?"

She saw Tom's eyes light with recollection. "But wha…er, I thought we had all the necessary precautions covered, like we always…" He let the sentence trail off as B'Elanna rose from the couch and strode across the room, pivoting to face him.

"But that's just it, don't you see? The _Srivani_ were not only fooling around with our hormones, Tom, they were fooling around with our birth control and our judgment. Don't we always, _always_ check _everything_ before we make love, even though we know everything's fine? And why the hell would we do it in a _junction_ like animals?"

Tom frowned slightly, as the full realization of what she was saying hit him, and then relief spread across his face. B'Elanna noticed his eyes lost their focus as well.

"Tom?"

"Huh? Oh, I'm sorry, B'Elanna. I was just thinking how grateful I am that the Doc and Seven were able to flush out those aliens before they could take their experiments any further."

She absorbed what he had said, the meaning behind it, her engineer's brain clicking rapidly through several possible scenarios, all pretty bad. "Uh, yeah, me too."

Silence filled the room. B'Elanna looked away, only to turn her gaze back to him, bringing her focus back to the subject at hand. "I'm not sure I want this baby, Tom. We were _used_ by those…those…_people_. This baby was conceived without our knowledge as part…part of an experiment! I know the Doc said the baby was okay, but…but how do we really know they didn't affect it somehow?"

She switched tracks abruptly, her voice rising. "And what if it _is_ all right, what if everything _is_ okay? What about _that_, Tom? You wanna be a daddy? God, do I want to be somebody's _mother_?" She huffed and cast her eyes to the ceiling, bright with unshed tears. "Christ, what a joke _that_ is!"

She dropped her head to glare right into his face. "And besides, besides, what kind of life would a kid have on board this crummy starship?" Her voice had taken on hysteria.

Tom spoke, but he did not say any of the things she was expecting him to say. B'Elanna knew she had challenged him to respond, and it looked to her like he really _wanted_ to, but he did not. He didn't express his opinion, nor did he argue or, thank god, crack a joke. Instead he made a small request.

"B'Elanna, come here."

Her tightly-held control, slipping already, began to disintegrate at this, but she could not move to him. She folded her arms across her chest and turned her back to him, biting on her bottom lip. She did not want him to see the tears that had begun to slide down her cheeks.

But it was too late. "Oh, Bella." He rose and walked to her. She allowed him to take her in his arms because she could not think of a way to stop him and wasn't sure she wanted to.

Standing in the circle of his arms, with her head against his uniformed chest, she wept like her heart was breaking.

**oOo oOo oOo**

In her ready room, Captain Janeway was being briefed by the Holodoctor on the health status of her chief engineer.

_As soon as Tom learned that B'Elanna had gone to Sickbay that morning instead of Engineering, his immediate request for permission to go to Sickbay had been so stunningly heartfelt that Janeway granted it without hesitation. After all, B'Elanna never went _voluntarily_ to Sickbay._

_But after almost an hour had passed without word, she began to get a little worried. If B'Elanna's illness was something serious, she wondered why she had not been contacted. The very fact that she had not been contacted after all this time was cause for concern in itself. These were her people, her _family_, and she did not like it when one of them became ill, any more than she had liked it when her sister, Phoebe, got sick. She left the Bridge to Chakotay and had entered her ready room, intent on finding out what was going on._

Signally Sickbay, Janeway waited for the Doctor to answer her. "Yes, Captain?" he smiled at her.

"How's B'Elanna?" she asked abruptly.

"As well as can be expected," he answered. "Considering her condition."

"Her _condition_?" Janeway's eyebrows raised slightly. "You don't mean…?"

"Yes, Captain, I do." He nodded.

"Well, that's a relief," Janeway sighed, leaning back in her chair. "I was afraid she was sick."

"Not exactly," he shook his head. "She is exactly three weeks pregnant."

"Three weeks?" Her eyebrows raised again in sudden comprehension. "You mean during…"

"Yes. During those little experiments that were practiced on us."

"How's the baby?"

"The baby is a perfectly normal blend of Klingon and Human genes, and nothing else," he quickly assured her. "The _Srivani_ were just experimenting with their hormones and birth control to get them to perform unprotected sexual intercourse in order to gather data on their response to a pregnancy."

"I see," Janeway sighed again.

"It is entirely possible, had the _Srivani_ remained on board, that they intended to follow through on B'Elanna's pregnancy, right through birth and child-rearing." He paused just long enough for Janeway to realize there was a _but_ coming. She leaned forward, waiting for it.

"But there _is_ one catch, Captain, and it has nothing to do with any alien experiment."

**oOo oOo oOo**

Twenty minutes later, Tom Paris returned to his station on the Bridge, looking pale and preoccupied, and Kathryn Janeway arrived in the corridor outside B'Elanna Torres' quarters. She signaled for entry.

"Come."

The door hissed open and Janeway stepped into the slightly overheated room. She remained standing just inside the door. B'Elanna was sitting on the couch, her knees drawn up to her chest.

"B'Elanna. I am so sorry to have to invade your privacy so quickly and so thoroughly."

B'Elanna looked up and smiled tiredly, her eyes red-rimmed and puffy. "It's all right, Captain. I know this ship's a fish bowl. I knew when I told Joe this morning that I'd be late that this wouldn't be a secret for very long. Tom looked like hell when he left here, and I'm sure Harry won't stop bothering him until he tells all." She realized belatedly that the captain was still standing by the door.

"Oh, Captain, I'm sorry. Please sit down." She gestured to the couch. Can I get you a cup of coffee?"

Janeway settled herself next to B'Elanna. "No thanks, I'm already over my limit for the morning." There was a short pause before the captain continued. "I know I'm a poor excuse for a ship's counselor, B'Elanna, but I got the feeling you might need someone besides Tom to talk to about this.

"You know there are people distinctly on one side of the fence or the other on this issue, and I won't kid you that there is probably opposition to one of the choices right here on _Voyager_, but it is still your _choice_. I hope you understand you are free to make it, and I will support you no matter what your final decision is."

B'Elanna snorted softly, picking at a loose thread in the blanket covering her legs. "Have you been talking to Tom?"

"No. Why?"

"I think that's exactly what he said."

Janeway smiled warmly and placed her hand on B'Elanna's knee, in her customary need to touch her people. "Well, then, the amount of support has just doubled." She leaned back on the couch.

"I can't pretend to know personally what you're going through right now, B'Elanna, but I _do_ know this decision is not an easy one. The Doctor told me the fetus is healthy and shows no evidence of the genetic tags that were imbedded in the crew during the experiments."

B'Elanna nodded.

"While I'd be the first to admit that the idea of a new baby on _Voyager_ sounds delightful, there is a certain amount of reality that must be taken into consideration. As you well know, this is _not_ the greatest environment in which to bring up a child.

"I'm not saying for one minute that you wouldn't be a good mother, B'Elanna, or that you and Tom wouldn't be absolutely wonderful parents, I'm only saying that it wouldn't be the same here on _Voyager_. We're not a family ship, like the _Enterprise_-D, nor was _Voyager_ designed or equipped to be a generational one." B'Elanna nodded again as Janeway continued. "Naomi Wildman, sweet as she is, has not had an easy time of it. She spends her days with a sitter while her mother works, and sometimes she spends nights with a sitter as well, if Samantha has to take an extra shift.

"I realize it would be a little different with your child, in that you'd have Tom helping you, but how would you feel the first time you both pulled double shifts and had to leave the baby with a sitter for several days? And what about the second time, or the third? And what if we're boarded by hostile aliens again?" She removed her hand from B'Elanna's knee to use it as a gesturing tool.

"Do you know what Tuvok did with Naomi to keep her from being displaced by the _Nyrians_?"

In all honesty, B'Elanna gave very little thought to the child in general. She had certainly not thought of her during the incident with the _Nyrians_, that so-called "peaceful" bunch who tried to take over the ship by trans-locating _Voyager_'s crew one by one into a self-contained biosphere prison on their huge habitat ship, replacing them with their own people.

When they were all returned safely to _Voyager_, she had been so absorbed with putting ship's systems to right again after Chakotay's calculated sabotage that she had barely taken care of _herself_, let alone consider someone else.

"No, Captain, I don't."

"Even though Naomi was frightened and her mother hysterical, Tuvok convinced Samantha that this would be the best course of action to guarantee her daughter's safety. He put her inside a torpedo casing, along with rations and water, and told her just to stay there until he returned for her. Samantha was a wreck until she was able to put her hands on her daughter again."

In all the thinking B'Elanna had done over the past couple of hours, this scenario never crossed her mind. In the warm room, she felt goosebumps rise on her arms and along the backs of her thighs.

Janeway sighed. "And that's not even the hardest…" She stopped mid-sentence, turned her head to look at B'Elanna, and swiveled back to look blankly across the room. "Oh my god, B'Elanna, listen to me. I sound like I'm telling you to terminate your pregnancy. That was not my intention." She had moved forward on the couch and rested her elbows on her thighs, letting her hands dangle between her knees, shaking her head in disbelief at her own words.

But B'Elanna came to her rescue. "No, Captain, that's not what it sounds like to me. It sounds to me like you're trying to determine the best thing for your ship and your crew and you want to make sure I understand the realities of having a baby on _Voyager_. I need to hear this. Go on."

Janeway continued to sit mutely until B'Elanna fixed her with the Klingon version of Janeway's own _look_. Under that stare, puffy red eyes and all, Kathryn Janeway could no more remain silent than she could exist without breathing.

"I was…saying that the hardest part of Naomi's life is her being unable to do all the things a child her age living on Earth or in any colony on any planet would have gotten to do a hundred times already."

B'Elanna knew the next part. After she had cried herself out, she and Tom had begun to talk about the baby. Among many other things, they had talked about this very subject. She knew all the words.

"I know, Captain. She has never had the opportunity to feel real sunlight, has never gone swimming in a real lake or run down a cool forest path. She's never had a playmate her age, aside from the ones Harry created for her on the holodeck, never had a little girlfriend 'sleep over.' She's never made a snowman or jumped into a pile of crisp, dry leaves. She's never played tag with schoolmates on the playground, or had a big fight with any of them, or sat around a campfire singing songs and telling ghost stories.

"She's never going to be able to go anywhere but this starship, and when we all finally begin to grow old and feeble, she may well be the only one left to get us home."

Janeway nodded and took up the conversation. "While this may be the very argument for deciding that all of us, right now, should begin pairing off and attempt to start 'growing our own' replacement crew, it's clear this argument is not a very rational one, even if you've already gotten started on that." She smiled, and B'Elanna was reminded that there was still room for humor even in the midst of a tough situation.

Janeway patted B'Elanna's knee and brought her blue-gray eyes to bear on B'Elanna's puffy black ones.

"B'Elanna, if you want, I'm ready to turn a corner of hydroponics into a day care facility, but if not, I'll support that decision as well. We must all follow our hearts on this issue, and I can no more dictate to your heart than you can to mine."

After having talked about young Naomi Wildman, before she left to return to the Bridge, Janeway asked if it would be all right if she shared this news with Samantha. B'Elanna agreed, noting somewhere in the back corner of her mind how Janeway could be so very _maternal_ at times.

This thought did not necessarily upset her.

**oOo oOo oOo**

A half-hour after her shift ended, B'Elanna stood before the door to Sickbay, just outside sensor range.

Once she had finally gotten herself to Engineering, the afternoon had turned out to be both a blessing and a curse.

She had spent the majority of her time behind her desk in her office, completing various and sundry reports, mainly because she didn't trust her queasy stomachs. No one questioned her, since it was not at all unusual for her to do this. She had been absorbed in one such report when she heard someone softly clearing their throat at the open entrance to her office. She looked up into the uncertain face of Samantha Wildman.

**oOo oOo oOo**

"_Lieutenant, I'm sorry if I'm disturbing you. I can come back…"_

"_No, no, Ensign. Please come in. Sit down." She gestured to the chair opposite her desk and watched as the blonde science officer settled into it, dropping a bag at her feet._

"_The Captain told me about your…condition. When I asked if I could take a moment right away to come and talk to you, she seemed relieved. She said she was afraid she had been too harsh when she talked to you this morning and asked if I would convey her apology." Samantha smiled and tilted her head as if sharing an in-joke._

"_Yeah, you and I both know it's the captain's _job_ to be harsh. Besides, she wasn't, so when you go back to the Bridge, you can just tell her she can save her apology for some time when it really counts, like when I make a repair she swears can't be done." The words came out rough, but B'Elanna's smile belied her tone._

"_Lieutenant…"_

"_Please, call me B'Elanna."_

"_Um, well, B'Elanna, I don't mean to invade your privacy or anything, I just wanted to tell you how…how happy I am that I have Naomi. But it sure didn't start out that way._

"_When the Doc told me I was pregnant, I was scared to death! Here I was, out in the middle of nowhere, without my husband, without anyone but this crew of people I hardly knew. I felt certain I could not go through with it."_

_She dropped her head. "And I was afraid of you."_

_B'Elanna started._

_Samantha raised her head in time to catch the look on B'Elanna's face. "Oh, no, Lieuten—B'Elanna, not _you_, specifically, but the Maquis, you know? I was Starfleet, well I guess I still _am_, but we were sent to the Badlands to find you and bring you in. It was supposed to be a two-week tour. And here I was, pregnant and alone on a ship that had been cast to the ends of the universe with a whole bunch of you, trying to get behind the captain's orders that you would be integrated into the crew. _

"_I told the Doc I didn't want the baby. Even though I thought I might never see my husband again, I was certain I didn't want to bring his child into the world in which I was now living. It would have been too hard, and I felt too alone and scared._

"_But Kes helped me, you know? I think we spent something like two days talking. She told me how brief and precious Ocampan life was, how precious she thought_ all_ life was, particularly the interesting new humans she had met._

"_When I told her my husband was not human, she was even more thrilled. Aside from you, B'Elanna, there are no others of mixed heritage on board, at least not mixed species. Kes thought it was the greatest thing in the galaxy. She saw my pregnancy and the birth of my baby as the way to begin turning _Voyager _into a sort of extended family, rather than a starship full of strangers and enemies. She was big on harmony, you know?" She shook her head. "Gosh, I miss her an awful lot."_

_B'Elanna had not realized until then that she missed Kes, too. It would have been nice to have her to talk to now, as Samantha had then. Clearly the tiny Ocampan had been able to do something perhaps no one else could have. She convinced a frightened young woman that keeping her baby was her best option – and not only that, but that her infant would be a welcome gift to everyone. B'Elanna wondered absently how Kes would do with an _angry_ young woman._

_Samantha continued. "Of course, I didn't see her point of view at first, but at the end of the two days, I realized she was exactly right. That's when I went to tell the captain."_

_As B'Elanna watched, an expression crossed Samantha's face that B'Elanna could not identify except to say it looked like _loss_._

"_I went into labor just before we went through that subspace divergent field and all the ship's matter was duplicated._

"_Because there were complications during birth, I was scared all over again, and this time even Kes couldn't help me. When the proton bursts from the other Voyager damaged our medical systems and my baby girl died, I wanted to die, too. The Doc had to sedate me, I was so hysterical._

"_I named her Ruth."_

_B'Elanna was confused for a moment, and then it hit her. She had watched Harry die, shot out into the vacuum of space. He had been replaced by the other Harry – and so had Samantha's baby. "Naomi…Naomi is from the _duplicate Voyager_, the same as Harry."_

_Samantha nodded. "Yes. And when Harry put her into my arms, I thought my heart would explode with joy. She was perfect. Healthy. Wailing. Completely and exactly the same as the little baby I had just given birth to._

"_But I couldn't call her Ruth, B'Elanna, and I'm not sure you can understand about that."_

_Suddenly, B'Elanna _could_ understand, though she had no idea how she had come to that understanding._

"_So I named her Naomi, from the story of two women in a holy book from Earth called the Bible. Ruth and Naomi. _

"_She's such a joy, B'Elanna. She was an easy infant, and she's grown into a pleasant, happy child, even considering how limiting her life is here on _Voyager_._

"_And with those darn horns, she looks just like Gres. When she was still tiny, I cried when I thought about whether or not she would grow to resemble him. And now that she does, I think it's one of the greatest things about her. She's a little piece of my husband, right here, warm and alive. And even though my work sometimes keeps me from her for days at a time, I always know she'll be there when I get back to my quarters."_

_B'Elanna thought about her own mother, about all the times she had screamed at B'Elanna to stop being so much like her father, so weak, so _Human_._

_Samantha's voice had taken on excitement. "Naomi and I have a ball together. She reads to me, or sometimes she allows me to read to her. We take bubble baths together and watch videos and play tons of games._

"_And every time it's okay, she's allowed to go planetside with me, and we get to explore and run around as much as we can. Neelix accompanies us on many of these occasions. She adores Neelix. He's her godfather, you know, and her number one sitter, has been from the start."_

_She dropped her voice, narrowed her eyes, and looked around conspiratorily. "And sometimes, well, sometimes we have races down the corridor outside our quarters, or I'll sit her in my desk chair and wheel her down the corridor at warp six. I know it's not safe, and Tuvok would have Vulcan kittens if he knew, but, boy, do we have a lot of fun!" She started laughing so heartily that B'Elanna could do nothing else but join her._

_Samantha caught her breath and glanced at the time. "Oh! I gotta go! I told the captain I'd only be gone a few minutes, and here it's been almost an hour." She jumped up. B'Elanna rose from her chair and came out from behind her desk._

"_Samantha, thanks for telling me all this." Although she had made no motions to hug the woman, Samantha had other ideas. She brought B'Elanna into a fierce embrace._

"_Hey, no problem." Samantha broke the hug but kept her arms loosely around B'Elanna, bringing one hand up to smooth out a stray lock of hair on B'Elanna's dark head._

"_Listen, it's still your choice, you know? I made my decision and I'm happy with it, but I know my choice is not someone else's. I've always been of the opinion that every woman should be free to decide on her own, no matter the final outcome._

"_But since we don't have Kes anymore, I felt like I _had_ to come talk to you, to tell you that even though it can be frustrating and sometimes frightening, it's not all messy diapers, spilled milk, and cut fingers. She winked. "Nor is it as horrible being a kid on _Voyager_ as the captain may have led you to believe._

"_Certainly, we're all at risk out here, with no back-up from Starfleet, but we've also had a whole lot of great times, haven't we?"_

_B'Elanna smiled at the thought of the luaus and the talent shows. "Yeah, we sure have."_

"_Plus, if anything or anyone _should_ threaten us again, I know with absolute certainty that my little girl has the best protection in the world. Tuvok may be an easy mark for teasing, but he'd walk through fire before he'd let anyone harm a hair on her horny little head. Whoa, gotta go! Bye!" She spun on her heels and flew out._

_B'Elanna glanced down and noticed the bag beside the chair Samantha had been sitting in. She bent over and looked inside. Inside was a handmade baby blanket, done in a tightly-knit stitch in shades of pastel green and yellow. There was a note pinned to it._

Dear B'Elanna,

This is the blanket Captain Janeway made for Naomi. I don't mean to get all mushy on you, but my daughter and I would like you to have it, no matter what you decide. The captain doesn't skimp when it comes to making baby blankets. This one has worn like dilithium crystals.

Samantha and Naomi

_B'Elanna nearly started to bawl right there in her office, but she managed to swallow it back, going out into the engine room and distracting herself with her warp core._

_**oOo oOo oOo**_

_Time continued to pass quietly in Engineering, but it seemed to B'Elanna that every time she'd venture out into the engine room, she'd immediately become conscious of the actions of one ensign, who would glare darkly at her and make a great show of purposely avoiding her._

_B'Elanna endured this treatment for about an hour before deciding she had had enough. She cornered Ensign Cellini, one of her own, a former Maquis, and demanded she explain her behavior. Cellini did not waste words._

"_I saw what was in the bag Sam brought to your office, and I noticed she didn't leave with it. I've seen the way you've been acting today, holing up in your office and not saying much. What do you think I am, stupid? You're pregnant." Anna stated this bitterly and continued without waiting for confirmation from B'Elanna. "I heard you and Sam laughing and I heard the word _choice_." She snorted. "There is no _choice_. If you terminate this pregnancy, you terminate a _baby_, and to me, that's murder." She stood defiant, eyes blazing, daring B'Elanna to respond._

_Although B'Elanna's foremost thought was to write the woman up for insubordination and to bark this intention at her in volumes that would make a Klingon warrior proud, she let this protocol slide in lieu of her next thought, which was more a feeling than anything else. It was sorrow, a heavy, building ache that this issue could divide people so viciously, even people who had been friends._

Oh Anna, you must never have been in my situation, or even known anyone who was, or you would not have spoken so righteously to me_._

_Heart hammering in her chest, she spoke in dangerously soft tones. "Your viewpoint has been noted, Ensign. Dismissed," and could only hope the woman had enough sense to realize how close she had come to being out on her ear._

_She had retreated, then, to the relative safety of her office, her heartbeat returning to normal only after she received a call of support from Harry on the Bridge._

_Ensign Cellini's request for transfer was on her desk at the end of the day. _

_It would be hard to escape on _Voyager_, but clearly the ensign wished to try. B'Elanna did not care to think about what Anna might do if she chose to terminate, although she did recognize it as a bridge she might have to cross in the future._

_Even in the 24__th__ Century, no matter how enlightened everyone claimed to be, some things did not change._

**oOo oOo oOo**

And now, B'Elanna stood here, knowing the Doctor and Tom were waiting for her on the other side of the door.

In the end, it was what it had been in the beginning: her choice.

She stepped into sensor range and the doors slid open.

End Chapter 1

**ooo ooo ooo ooo ooo**

*6/01: Under the category "Taking Liberties With Canon," I have just discovered that Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch, in their Star Trek: Voyager, Section 31, pro novel, "Shadow," used this name for the aliens from the episode "Scientific Method." I use it here because I can!


	2. The Bittersweet Smile

Author's Note: (11/00) This is a sequel to "B'Elanna's Choice 1." It is not necessary that you read the original story to understand what's going on here, but it could help. Written in October, 1999. Rated PG.

"Mi amor, mi corazon" is, simply translated, "my love, my heart" and "adios" is, of course, "goodbye." This is taken out of context from the song, "Spanish Is The Loving Tongue," by Charles Badger Clark, Jr., and Marc Williams. The song is best performed by Judy Collins on her 1976 album, "Bread and Roses," although Emmylou Harris does a fair rendition of it on her 1981 album, "Cimarron." If that don't date me, friends, nuthin' will.

Disclaimer: Paramount, er, CBS owns it all. Probably always will. I accept this.

B'Elanna's Choice 2:  
The Bittersweet Smile  
by DianeB

**One Month**

One of the things B'Elanna did before returning to Engineering was fabricate herself a coverall, a smock of sorts, that would shield her stomach from any sort of drip, leak, failure, snap, crackle, or pop her beloved engine room might have to offer in the course of any given day. She was damned sure she wasn't going to stop working, as was daringly suggested by both Tom _and_ the Doctor when she had told them a week earlier that she had decided to keep the baby. They valued their life and their programming, respectively, and so had wisely refrained from saying anything more when she bellowed some half-remembered string of Klingon expletives at them and stormed out of Sickbay.

The smock resembled very much an Engineering uniform, except it was made of sturdier stuff than the uniforms, and it hung kind of funny on her. At least _now_ it did. Although she had studied the information from a couple of data padds, and had measured carefully, she suspected she would be straining the limits of this outfit before it was all said and done. She hadn't even begun to consider her personal wardrobe.

This whole thing was just a little too weird for her to believe as yet. Aside from the nausea and vomiting, occasional lightheadedness, and a desire to eat everything in sight – the good, the bad, and the Neelix concoctions – she didn't really feel any different than she had four weeks ago.

Another thing she did, reluctantly, was return to Sickbay and endure a thorough pelvic exam, something she couldn't remember _ever_ having had before, as well as the Holodoctor's lecture about the care and feeding of a pregnant Human/Klingon body. She also had to suffer a series of vitamin injections and promise to take daily a huge vitamin tablet, a bottle of which he had thrust into her hands as she was trying to make her escape. Before she could get out, he also thrust a padd into her hands.

"What's this?" she asked, unable to contain the growl that surrounded this short question. As it was, she had only just bitten back the _pahtk_. "Haven't you done enough?"

She noticed the Doctor was doing a fine job of pretending he did not hear her tone, pretending also that she was waiting expectantly for his answer.

_Well, _she thought, out of the blue_, I guess I _am_ waiting _expectantly. She almost moaned aloud at the awfulness of it. _Great Kahless, I have seriously _got_ to stop listening to Tom_. She brought her attention back to the Doctor.

"…a list of foods you should be eating. Foods you should be eating for the next eight months, give or take a week. Following the list are several suggested menus. Since you were not planning to be pregnant, you did not prepare your body in advance for a new life. Now, we simply must play a little 'catch-up,' if you will." His left eyebrow stole up his forehead, waiting for her to take a look at the padd. She complied, glancing down at the first item on the list.

_Cow's milk_? "Milk, Doc? Gods, I _hate_ milk. Besides, the only way I can get milk is to replicate it, right? Where am I supposed to get eight months' worth of rations?"

Of course, the Doctor was ready for this question. "Good of you to ask, B'Elanna, because I now have the pleasure of advising you that the captain has permitted you unlimited replicator use for the duration of this pregnancy, provided, of course, you stick with the items on this list, and you supplement it with meals in the mess hall." He smiled, pleased with himself for having been able to impart this information to her.

_Meals in the mess hall? Neelix's multi-colored mashed whatevers? That _green_ stuff? Leola root everything?_ She was only eating it because she was hungry just about all the time now and couldn't afford to replicate every meal. Now she could, or at least every _other_ meal. She looked at the list again. Unfortunately, milk was still there, and it was starting to look mighty good to her. This did nothing but make one of her stomachs threaten rebellion.

"Yeah, that's great. Thanks."

The Doctor looked a little hurt that she wasn't more excited about the replicator use, but she didn't spare a speck of sympathy for him. "May I go now, please?"

"Yes, but I'd like to see you at this same time next month."

"Right." She exited before he could get in his usual parting word. Gone as she was from Sickbay, she did not hear him mutter _hormones_.

**oOo oOo oOo**

Tom sat at his post on the Bridge, his right leg pumping vigorously, generating enough energy to light a turbolift, to which he was oblivious. There was nothing going on on the viewscreen, so his mind was elsewhere.

Elsewhere on B'Elanna's belly.

_A baby, a baby, a baby. She's gonna have a baby. _Our_ baby!_ He was so excited, he could barely contain himself there in his chair. As it was, he burst into a wide smile, to which he was equally oblivious. His fingers danced over the console, making minute and unnecessary adjustments, doing it without thought, still daydreaming about his child._ His child!_ He never noticed that Janeway had come up behind him, until she curled her warm hand over his shoulder, causing him to jump in surprise.

"Whatever are you thinking about, Lieutenant?" she asked. He missed entirely the amusement in her voice, so startled was he by her touch.

He swiveled quickly in his chair, ready for business, the smile gone from his face, but when his blue eyes met her twinkling gray ones, his smile returned twofold. He wasn't kidding anyone, least of all his captain.

"There's nothing going on up here, Tom. Why don't you go see how B'Elanna's doing? Didn't you say she had an appointment with the Doctor this morning?"

"Yeah, uh, yes Captain. I, uh, you mean I can go?" Not very professional, but at the mention of B'Elanna's name, his tongue suddenly forgot how to form words.

"Dismissed, Lieutenant." He shot out of his seat and into the turbolift. Janeway and Chakotay exchanged smirks at his rapid departure. Harry just shook his head. Tuvok stood stoic, as always, although anyone who knew him well and who looked close enough could see the warm light of understanding in his eyes.

It might very well be a long eight months.

**oOo oOo oOo**

Tom entered B'Elanna's quarters to the sound of retching. He went straight for the bathroom, where he found her exactly where he knew she'd be – hanging over the toilet, puking whatever it was she had eaten. It was odd to him, how she ate everything in sight because she was always starving, and then puked a good portion of it back up. Had his own mother gone through this _three_ times?

"Bella," he said softly, so as not to startle her, caressing the back of her head. It appeared as though this bout was coming to an end, so he reached over her to snatch her washrag from its hook. He wet it with cool water and ran it gently over her lips and face as she straightened up in front of him, flushing the toilet as she did so.

"Oh, gods, Tom." She closed her eyes and leaned into the cool rag. "That feels _so_ good."

"B'Elanna, what did the Doc say about this…this nausea? It can't be good for you." He put the rag down and they walked together to sit on the couch in the living area.

"Well, no, but it isn't exactly bad, either. It's just part of the plan. He said it might continue right up to the moment of birth. Sounds delightful, doesn't it? Me in labor and puking at the same time. Ugh.

"But have you noticed I don't puke every single day now? The Doc said it would ease, but probably not go away entirely. It all has something to do with my hybrid physiology, gods, _everything_ has to do with my hybrid physiology, though he did manage to politely add that some fully Human women are nauseous throughout the entire pregnancy. Anyway, I'm hungry, and guess what?" She reached for a padd on the low table in front of her.

Tom marveled at her recuperative powers and at the fact that she was hungry. This was going to be a long eight months. "'Guess what' what?"

"The Doc said the captain gave me unlimited use of the replicator, as long as I use it to replicate the food on this list. If you're here when I'm hungry, like _now_, I say you get to eat with me." She held the padd out to him.

He took it and looked down. Cow's milk, first thing. _Oh yeah, let's just whip up a couple of nice, big frothy glasses of that disgusting stuff_. He hated it almost more than she did. But as he continued to scroll down the list, it started looking better and better. Lots of dairy products. _Oh, right, calcium_. But, hey now, there was also beef, chicken, fish, about a million vegetables, including many of his all-time favorites, multi-grain bread and cereal, muffins, eggs, all manner of assorted fruits and nuts, and even, even, chocolate. Yes! Chocolate cake was right there, last on the list. Not even a hint of blood pie or _gagh_.

Was the Doctor getting soft? Well, bully for him! They were gonna have one heck of a meal! And these next eight months might not be so bad after all.

**oOo oOo oOo**

**Three Months**

Time continued to pass on the starship _Voyager_, and B'Elanna and Tom continued their workday routine and their lives, same as everybody else. B'Elanna even consented to allow Tom to start a betting pool on the sex of the baby, which they had not learned since she wanted to be surprised. Tom swore he would not cheat and went around collecting replicator ration credits. It was about fifty-fifty now, and he was having a ball.

Near the end of the third month, B'Elanna began to seriously wonder when she would fully come to realize she was pregnant. Certainly, she had thickened around the middle, and her breasts were _getting larger_, to the drooling delight of Thomas Eugene Paris, but she still didn't feel pregnant, at least not like she thought she was supposed to feel, which she really didn't have a clear idea of, anyway. Having nothing to compare it to, she studied data padds. But their information was clinical, and the darn padds didn't hold any information on the specific genetic blending she carried. There was a program that would enable her to extrapolate possibilities if she so desired, but the program cautioned that each woman's pregnancy was unique and results could vary greatly from reality.

She found this to be true, as well, when she talked to other crew members. In the first place, there were precious few for her to talk to. Some of the men had families back home, but there were, in fact, few women aboard who had experienced their own pregnancy, and certainly no other Human/Klingon woman who had carried a child three-quarters Human and one-quarter Klingon.

She talked for a while in the mess hall with Anna Cellini, the young Maquis woman who had been the one to openly challenge her about ending the pregnancy. Anna had long ago apologized for all the horrible things she had said to B'Elanna in the engine room on that fateful day, but she admitted now that she had absolutely no idea what B'Elanna might expect, as she was an only child of very strict, religious parents. Which was, she confessed, why she had joined the Maquis in the first place.

Even Samantha Wildman, who had been so very, very helpful when B'Elanna had first been faced with the choice of whether or not to terminate, could not give her specifics about what she might experience or when, since a Human/Ktarian pregnancy was light years away from a Human/Klingon one. About the only thing they had in common was that they both carried the fetus in their uterus. After that, things went in unlike directions, and even Samantha herself repeated what the data padd had stated, that each woman's pregnancy was unique unto itself, no matter who created the baby.

Talking to the Doctor was out. In spite of his genuine effort not to, he tended to sound like a data padd himself. Besides, she was already seeing plenty of him, nevermind how much of her _he_ was seeing!

She allowed herself one contemplative moment for her mother. It had never occurred to B'Elanna to ask her anything about her pregnancy. She wondered now if her mother had experienced any specific health problems, or if any aspect of her pregnancy and birth had been hard for her. Of all the things her mother used to regularly blame her for, or accuse her of, she never once mentioned the occasion of her birth. B'Elanna considered that. Her mother was a full Klingon, a strapping specimen at that, and she carried a half-Human child. Perhaps her birth had hardly made a difference to her. B'Elanna snorted softly. Just another reminder of how weak Humans were. _Ha_, B'Elanna thought, with insight she did not know she possessed, _shows how much _you_ know, Mom. This is making a _big _difference to me, and there's nothing at all weak about it. It's really a shame you'll probably never get to meet your only grandchild_.

She sighed. One more new experience to chalk up to life in the Delta Quadrant.

**oOo oOo oOo**

One evening, a few days after her musings about when she would start to really _feel_ pregnant, B'Elanna was lying on the bed by herself in the quarters she now shared with Tom. Gazing vacantly at the crib in the corner, she was absently fingering the baby blanket Sam and Naomi had given her, which was presently draped across her midsection, when a very strange thing happened.

She felt a subtle _fluttering_ in the pit of her second stomach, or somewhere very nearby it. But it wasn't so much a fluttering, as a purposeful stirring, an intentional movement within her. She sat up slowly and placed her hand on her abdomen. The movement came again, and she was enchanted by it. Tears came to her eyes as she sat alone in the dark. She thought briefly about calling Tom, but she just didn't have the desire to hunt up her commbadge. Instead, she just sat there, tears streaming down her face, her lips curved into the bittersweet smile of the ages, her gaze focused inward.

The data padds had said this much. That she would feel a movement. And they had a name for it, called it a _quickening_. But nothing in the padds came anywhere near describing how beautiful a feeling it was, how alive and full it made her feel. Nothing quickened except her heartbeat, and she imagined she felt the baby's heartbeat quicken as well. She was pregnant, and the baby had finally alerted its mother to its presence within her, making it more than just a word, more than some vague occurrence six months hence. It was real. She carried _life_. She entered bliss.

**oOo oOo oOo**

This was where Tom found her a short time later, on the bed, teardrops still staining her face. He was immediately on alert, ready to call the Doctor, when she shook her head and told him to relax. He crawled up onto the bed and sat facing her.

"It moved, Tom, the baby moved." She placed her hand on her abdomen again, reached for his to cover hers, and gazed into his eyes. He didn't feel anything, but staring into her liquid brown eyes, he would have been perfectly content to drown there. "It was the most beautiful thing I have ever felt." She paused and then asked forthrightly, "Do you love me?" Adding softly,"_Dad_?"

His heart soaring and his gaze still lost in hers, Tom answered with the only words in his head. "I love you more than life itself."

She leaned forward and kissed him full on the lips, passionately, startling the heck out of him. But he wasted no time in returning the kiss with matching passion, bringing his arms around her and pulling her as close as he could.

To his further surprise, she uncrossed her legs and wrapped them around him, effectively sitting on his lap on the bed, her lips never leaving his. A certain portion of his anatomy eagerly responded to her body's siren call, and it wasn't long before a pile of clothing lay on the floor at the foot of the bed.

**oOo oOo oOo **

**Six Months**

As the second trimester came to a close, the damned smock finally stopped hanging so funny on her. B'Elanna was swelling into a glowing, very pregnant lady.

The entire crew, transformed over the years from a crew to a _family_, was aglow as much as B'Elanna herself. She and Tom could not go anywhere, either together or separately, without someone stopping to talk to them. The only thing B'Elanna had trouble understanding was other people's wanting to touch her.

With the patient help of Samantha and Naomi Wildman, B'Elanna came to learn to allow people into her personal space enough to touch her belly. This was perhaps the hardest thing she'd ever had to get used to, as she never cared for anyone to get too close, unless, of course, she was trying to rip their lungs out. She was amazed at this phenomenon, this sudden desire people had to touch her. But she recognized that the rest of the crew saw this baby as _their_ baby, too, and only wanted to share her happiness.

The saving grace was that everyone, except for Neelix, who apologized profusely when he realized what he had done, asked and received permission first before tentatively reaching out to lightly place their palm against the increasingly-firm mound of baby.

After a while, to her own astonishment, she actually came to look forward to these shy, precious connections. She was always careful to speak to her stomach during these hand-to-belly meetings, introducing whoever it was to her baby. Sam Wildman had told her this – that it was a good thing to talk to the baby – and she discovered she enjoyed it very much.

Maternity suited B'Elanna Torres, though people knew better than to actually _say_ that to her.

**oOo oOo oOo**

**Nine Months, six days**

B'Elanna was standing in front of a console by the warp core, ignoring yet another stab of discomfort and urge to pee, when her head started to pound. She picked her right hand up from its resting place upon the vast expanse of her stomach and rubbed her temple. Sue Nicoletti, standing to her left, spoke up immediately.

"Lieutenant? Are you all right?" She placed her hand on B'Elanna's arm.

The pain subsided as suddenly as it had come and she dropped her hand. "What? Oh, yes, Lieutenant, yes. I'm…I'm okay." She frowned because she had never felt that sort of pain before. The cramping she was getting used to, but this was something new.

It was Susan's job to watch B'Elanna for signs of labor, although B'Elanna did not know that. Susan was good at her job, being one of the few women on _Voyager_ who had given birth herself. She had long since recognized that B'Elanna was probably _already_ _in_ labor, and while she had been ready to allow B'Elanna a little more time, she did not care for this new development. Susan had no formal medical training, but she knew a swift, painful headache in a very pregnant woman was not a good sign at all. Risking disciplinary action, she ignored her superior's claim that she was "okay."

"B'Elanna, how about if we go to Sickbay now?" B'Elanna jerked her arm back and scowled at the lieutenant. "Watch it, Nicoletti. I told you I'm fine." She turned her back to Susan and lumbered towards her office. She hadn't taken three steps before a terrific pain sliced across her abdomen and a gush of warm liquid fell from her. She staggered and the pain in her head returned with a vengeance.

Susan was there instantly, grabbing her, taking all her weight, keeping her from falling hard to the floor. She freed one arm and viciously slapped her commbadge, even as she eased B'Elanna down. Her overloud voice echoed in the sudden quiet of the engine room.

"Nicoletti to Sickbay! Medical emergency! It's B'Elanna! Doc!" Before the words were completely gone from her, she felt the transporter take them.

**oOo oOo oOo**

**Birth**

B'Elanna was crying, moaning his name when Tom came tearing into Sickbay, nearly an hour and a half after she had been beamed there. His delay had only been because Susan, who had contacted Joe Carey in Engineering for permission to take time to tell Tom personally, had ended up having trouble locating him.

He had been off duty and out of uniform, helping Neelix take inventory in cargo bay two because he couldn't seem to keep his mind on anything more complex than counting the Delta Quadrant equivalent of cabbages. As the Fates would have it, his communicator was _not_ stowed away in his pocket like he thought, but lay by itself on the bedroom floor in his quarters, which is where Susan went first.

Though Nicoletti tried her best not to alarm him, he was quaking with adrenaline and fear by the time he got to Sickbay. Hearing B'Elanna only kicked his fear into warp. She should have been cursing, not crying.

"Lieutenant Torres, please, push for me now," the Doctor started again, trying to get her attention. He had not been successful up to this point, and he still wasn't, but he tried anyway. B'Elanna's labor so far had been rapid and very hard. Now, having reached the resting phase, her body was reluctant to continue, and B'Elanna was not cooperating, too exhausted to listen to him. In addition, her blood pressure had been rising since her arrival and she was not responding to medication to bring it down. Her half-Klingon physiology was asserting itself in all the wrong ways, and the Doctor found himself feeling oddly fearful, concerned not only for the life of the baby, but for B'Elanna herself.

He had quickly realized his mistake in allowing Lieutenant Nicoletti to leave, as he could have used another pair of hands, trained or not. He was, therefore, more than a little relieved to see Tom arrive, certain his presence would be able to bring her around and that his field medic training would be put to the true test. This child had to be delivered. _Right now_.

Tom skidded to a halt beside B'Elanna and picked her limp hand from the birthing chair, bringing it to his cheek. He bent low to her face, but her eyes were closed and she did not acknowledge him.

She sighed his name, still showing no sign that she knew he was there. "Tom…Tom…I don't want to do this anymore. I _can't_ do this. It hurts. It hurts so much and I'm tired."

The Doctor spoke. "Tom, you must get her to concentrate and push, or we won't have a live birth here." He did not have time to mince words. "We won't have much of B'Elanna, either."

Tom had never been so scared in all his life. He and B'Elanna had read up on possible complications during labor, but since B'Elanna's check-ups were always sterling and she was as strong as a horse, he foolishly thought it couldn't happen to them. No data padd could have prepared him for the sight of her, anyway.

She was slumped in the chair, soaked with sweat, taking ragged, uneven breaths, eerily sedate, and so unlike her usual spitfire self that his brain was actively lying to him, telling him it wasn't her. His heart, hammering in his chest, told him better. He brought her hand to his lips and held it there, her familiar, half-Human saltiness exploding on the tip of his tongue. He put his other hand gently into her damp hair, praying silently to a God he had not sought in many years. _Please, don't let her die, don't let the baby die, don't…don't…_

"B'Elanna, Bella, look at me, look here at me. The Doc says you have to push. You remember what we practiced, don't you? You _can_ do this. Look at me. Push now. Push." He kissed her hand again and she turned dull eyes to him, finally focusing on his pale face.

"Tom, thank gods you're here. I feel so strange."

_Was she not lucid_? He cast a frightened look at the Doctor and then quickly returned to her, struggling to keep his voice from trembling. "C'mon, sweetheart, push, like we practiced, okay?" To his immense relief, she nodded in response to his encouragement. He drew in a breath and pushed himself, willing her to copy him.

She took a deep, measured breath, held it, and sent a mighty push through her body, releasing the captured breath with a full-throated Klingon roar.

The Doctor visibly relaxed. "That's good, B'Elanna, very good. Relax a moment now." He glanced at the chair's readings. Blood pressure still nowhere near where it should be. "Push for me one more time, B'Elanna, all right?"

"C'mon, Bee," Tom added, "you're doing great, you're doing just great." Obediently, and without hesitation or doubt, she pushed and roared again.

The Doctor's computer brain scanned rapidly through what other options there were at this point, all of them invasive and unpleasant, all of them guaranteed to put baby and mother at further risk. What he wanted to do most, and what he knew would be the best thing, was to deliver this baby the way babies had been delivered for centuries. Childbirth was not a disease, it was a natural function of life, and the process was at its healthiest when allowed to occur without medical interference.

Besides, he and B'Elanna had discussed this, months earlier. She specifically _did not want_ medical interference, and she was adamantly Klingon about this. If Tom could keep her focused, things would turn out all right.

However, if Tom could _not_ keep her focused, he was fully prepared to violate B'Elanna's wishes and interfere medically to the very end of his software to ensure that things would, indeed, turn out all right. Suffering B'Elanna's wrath while cradling a squalling infant was _much_ preferable to the alternative and a very small price to pay.

Not for the first time, he fervently wished for Kes, for her gentle, soothing ways, and allowed one second's hope that her loving spirit was present in the room.

It was not long before B'Elanna felt a strong contraction building. In better control now, she closed her eyes, took several deep, cleansing breaths, and waited for it, but what she waited for, she never felt.

Instead, pain exploded behind her eyes, scattering shimmering sparkles of light against her eyelids. She heard the chair squeal a harsh warning and felt a sudden rush of movement from the two men around her. She heard the Doctor shout sternly to Tom, and then everything slipped away from her, the pain, Tom, Sickbay, the baby…

…_She was a child again, giggling in her father's arms as he danced her around the living room to a salsa beat that delighted her and angered her mother. He was murmuring to her in Spanish, words of love she did not quite understand, along with her pet name. "Mi amor, mi corazon, Little Bee, mi amor." And then he spoke a word she _did_ understand, as she felt her mother's strong arms grab her and pull her from him. "Adios, mi amor."_

"_Daddee, Daaddee!!!"_

_Then she was standing in a sunlit clearing in the forest. Chakotay was there, sitting cross-legged on the ground at her feet, his animal guide sitting next to him. She was a stunning beast, an aristocratic wolf, but sitting there as she was, with her jaw hanging open and her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth, she looked for all the world like she was about to burst out laughing._

"_Chakotay? Why are you here?"_

"_I might ask the same of you, B'Elanna. I thought you were having a baby."_

"_I was, er, I am – at least I _think_ I am. Okay, why am _I_ here?"_

"_I think she," Chakotay began, nodding his head towards the wolf, "has something she wants to show you, but she's a little bit afraid."_

"_She's afraid?"_

"_Yes, B'Elanna, all animal guides are afraid of you." He flashed her his dimpled, lopsided grin._

_She snickered in resignation. "I won't try to kill her or whatever it is she wants to show me. I promise."_

"_Good enough." Chakotay rose and stepped back, fading into the forest. The wolf got to her feet and stepped aside, allowing a tiny gray pup to bound forward, barking and nipping playfully at B'Elanna's ankles. "Oh my gosh! Look at you!" She bent and scooped the pup into her arms, laughing as it applied its tongue to her face and thrust its cold wet nose into her ear, huffing and yipping, sounding painfully loud…_

She returned abruptly to awareness, and with it came a magnificent pain that took her breath away. The chair's alarm was at top volume, but she could also hear Tom and the Doctor talking in low, urgent tones and could feel hands upon her. Responding instinctively to a primal urge deep within her, she arched her back, relaxed, took in a huge lungful of air and bore down as if she were trying to expel every bit of her insides through her birth canal, the sound escaping her not a roar but a scream.

The baby slid into the Doctor's outstretched arms and began wailing at the top of his miniature lungs. Grinning like a fool, the Doctor deftly severed the cord, wiped him off, diapered his tiny behind, wrapped him securely in a blanket, and transferred him to the waiting incubator. He returned to B'Elanna to take care of the last of the business of birth.

Tom was draped almost fully over B'Elanna, his left arm locked behind her left knee, holding the leg up as instructed by the Doctor. There was blood, sweat, and other bodily fluids everywhere. This was not a textbook birth, not by any stretch of anyone's imagination, but at least the chair had stopped screeching. He released B'Elanna's leg, carefully returning it to the chair. He straightened up and stared blankly at the wall. _What now_?

A hoarse whisper brought him back. "Tom?" He was instantly by her face, kissing her cheek, wiping sweat from her eyes and her forehead. His knees were threatening to buckle, but he remained on his feet.

"Bella, Belle, oh my angel, my angel."

She took his hand, smiling weakly. "Tom? My baby? Is it okay? What is it?"

He didn't understand at first and then realization dawned. "Oh! A boy, B'Elanna. It's a perfect, healthy boy and he's got a headful of black hair and…and ridges, Bee, he's got ridges, just like his beautiful…his…beautiful mother." He lost his control then, choked, and burst into tears.

B'Elanna's eyes began to close and Tom's heart rose to thump wildly in his aching throat. "B'Elanna!" Her eyes popped open but immediately began to close again. "Miguel," she said, but he didn't hear her. Panic was settling in. He was afraid for her eyes to close again. He looked frantically around for the Doctor and found him there beside him.

"It's all right, Tom, she's exhausted. She's just going to sleep this time." The Doctor carefully adjusted the chair to a horizontal position and with amazingly tender ministrations, began to wash her.

"Miguel," she whispered again, her eyes slitting open.

He didn't understand. "Miguel?"

"Name..him…Miguel? Feh…for my fa…father…my father." And her eyes slid completely closed.

Tom straightened and swayed. The Doctor steadied him. "Lieutenant, how about if you come over here and say hello to, what's that name? Miguel? And then maybe take a little nap? B'Elanna will sleep for quite a while and I'm sure you can use the rest yourself." He led him to the incubator.

Tom peered into it. His son was gorgeous, a little sweaty and red, perhaps, a little upset, but gorgeous. An exact image of his mother, though his forehead ridges were even less pronounced than hers and his hair was decidedly curly.

Glancing over at B'Elanna, he wondered for a moment how it could be that the Doctor could stop a _grand mal_ seizure from putting her into a coma, or worse, but could do little to relieve her labor or prevent his son's traumatic birth, without it causing even more problems. He had known that B'Elanna had not wanted the Doctor to perform any medical magic tricks, but still, as he fell heavily onto the biobed, he wondered where the balance was in all this.

Just then, the baby let out a resounding holler and, turning his head to again gaze upon B'Elanna's peaceful, sleeping form, he suddenly found the balance. He drifted into unconsciousness.

As the new little family lay sleeping in Sickbay – well, as _Mom and Dad_ lay sleeping in Sickbay – the crew of new "aunts and uncles" partied well into the night, exchanging replicator ration credits with gleeful abandon. They were, in fact, stockpiling most of them as a gift for the baby, since an official baby shower never quite came together in time. The bell tower Harry had created on Holodeck Two pealed out joyfully over ship-wide communications.

**Coda**

They settled on Andreas Michael Torres Paris. It was quite the mouthful, they agreed, but B'Elanna had decided that her father's name would do better as her son's middle name, and then translated it into the Anglo version for Tom. She found she preferred the rumbling cadence of _Andreas Torres_ over any other combination, pronouncing it in the manner of the ancient, earthy language that was part of her.

Studying the classic, dark features and lightly-ridged forehead of his newborn son, Tom Paris could find no fault with her preference. From his first lusty intake of _Voyager_'s recycled air, it was abundantly clear that _Mikey Paris_ this kid was _not_.

So, for the ship's official birth record, he was an honorable, four-name reflection of both his parents. For daily use, his name became a fractured, three-syllable reflection of his Klingon/Spanish warrior heritage.

Possessing possibly the finest set of lungs in the entire Delta Quadrant, it was only when one or the other of his parents hung over his crib and shouted "An…dre…_as_," rolling the "r" and hissing the "s" until they were blue in the face, that the baby would stop crying and start laughing. Mom or Dad would then join him, invariably lifting him into their arms, and all would be very, very right with the world.

End


End file.
